TV Watch: Big Love

The two-sentence round-up: Bill got one tiny step closer to winning the election, Barb pulled a Michael Richards at the casino, and Margie committed a carnal sin. This week&#x2019;s Homeland Security rating monitoring the moral fibers of the family is trending somewhere between Jim Crow and Clark Griswold. After the jump, more of what I mean.

The Tracy Flick-sponsored guide to winning a high school state senate election: Triple Dip decided that what his campaign really needed was an endorsement—so he flew to D.C. to chase down a Republican congressman on the street and basically offer him a cupcake for his support. Plan A failed. So he decided to stalk the congressman at a charity event. The only problem was he didn&#x2019;t have an invite. He stopped by the office of the firm sponsoring the event to try and buy his way in, but ended up offending the head-bitch-in-charge of the guest list, who just so happened to be Sissy Spacek (There&#x2019;s a lesson to be learned: don&#x2019;t mess with Carrie). Determined with the might of 1,000 Mormon angels, he crashed the party, cornered the congressmen, and probably wooed him with a wife or two. Bill didn&#x2019;t get the endorsement but he did convince him to stay neutral. Next week, Triple Dip&#x2019;ll be hanging posters in Salt Lake like it&#x2019;s nobody&#x2019;s business.

Worst wife of the week: Poor Barb. It totally made sense that Bill would leave her in charge of the casino while he was out of town, but her whole bringing together the tribe and the white man on the reservation bit couldn’t have bombed worse if she showed up in red-face handing out cigars and dream-catchers. She was put in charge of operating a few "sensitivity" seminars for the staff, and they literally told her &#x201C;Fuck you, white bitch. Get off our land.&#x201D; Ouch. Right after giving her "But my gardener is Native American!" defense, she drove off and ran over a girl with her breeder mobile by accident. In her final, also racist attempt to prove she’s just one of them, she gave the cripple she bulldozed a casino job and THEN took it back. Which no one on the rez found very funny. Kudos for subtlety though, Barb.

Big Love&#x2019;s best blackmailing so far (and also its first instance of sexting): Back on the compound, Dale the Trustee begged Alby to handover the Juniper Shit Creek books and records. Alby, probably trying to protect the paper trails that lead to his Manhunt subscriptions and dozens of purchases from Williams-Sonoma.com, gave him his best Blue Steele to lure the down-low brother back into bed. It worked. And in a post-coital moment straight from the handbook of Chuck Bass, Alby snapped a photo of the two in bed with a camera phone. Afterwards, the ghost of his dead dad visited him to give an &#x201C;I didn&#x2019;t raise no gay&#x201D; pep-talk. And, like a kid in the lockerroom who just struck out at T-ball, Alby teared up while pulling on his magic underwear. Seriously.

The worst reason yet to not come out of the closet: Dale, part-time lawyer, part-time ex-gay counselor, consoled fellow self-loather Alby with this nugget of wisdom: &#x201C;This burden—it only lasts a lifetime.&#x201D; Which is right up there with telling a cancer patient their hair will look AWESOME when it grows out or a leper that pinkies are totally overrated.

The something-more-taboo-than-polygamy award goes to Marge. In fact, not only did she win, she wiped the floor with all those BumpIt&#x2122; secured manes from the cult compound. Turns out Marge is really, really good at conning all the shut-in hoarders of the world into buying her shitty anklets and charm bracelets, so her boss at the home shopping station decided to give her a go at the coveted 7PM slot. Somehow, the rest of her 12-person family was busy during her primetime debut, so her sorta-son Ben canceled his Jesus Rock gig to surprise her on set and offer moral support. Marge got too excited, laid one on his lips, and, rather than gouging out his eyes, the little perv all but mouthed SCHWING

One of a few tricks Big Love&#x2019;s writers could borrow from Battlestar Gallatica: The term &#x201C;Frack&#x201D; in all of its forms and glory. &#x201C;What the H&#x201D; was catchy the first half dozen times it was employed, but what I&#x2019;m really aching for when Ginnifer Goodwin finally screws her son is a nice big, FCC-friendly &#x201C;motherfrackin&#x201D; like it&#x2019;s never been used before.

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